BIA Ch. 65

The real problem was that all the houses looked pretty much the same. They were mostly two- or three-story apartments, and the paint on the building walls was all peeling off. On top of that, they were covered in messy graffiti, so even if he had lived here, he probably wouldn’t be able to find it unless he remembered the graffiti on the specific apartment.

Plus, it was like, from the outside, the scenery looked familiar, like a déjà vu, but once he came inside, it was more common than he thought, just a shabby residential area. Not only the old houses but also the atmosphere that hung heavily in the alleys. It wasn’t quite a slum, but it was the typical scenery of a poor village. It seemed like in movies or TV dramas, if there was a poor but smart and honest protagonist, they always lived in a neighborhood like this. It was that kind of cliché, a very cookie-cutter scene.

“What do you think?”

Isaiah said, looking at a large mattress dumped at the entrance of an apartment. He wondered how many days it had been left there; the traces of someone having peed on the mattress several times were blatant.

“About what?”

“Just, about this neighborhood.”

“First of all, I don’t think there’ll be any restaurants.”

“No. I mean, is it possible that I lived here?”

“If you want to believe that, I won’t stop you.”

Bran clicked his tongue briefly, as if he was annoyed. A beat-up pickup truck was parked so badly that it narrowed the width of the road. Putting the gear in reverse and turning the steering wheel, Bran said,

“If it were me, I wouldn’t want to believe I lived in a neighborhood like this, even if I had to manipulate my memories.”

“Manipulated my memories?”

Me? Isaiah asked, looking surprised. Bran didn’t even glance at Isaiah, repeating small backward and forward movements.

“Didn’t I tell you? That memory isn’t your real memory.”

“That’s…”

He had said it, for sure. That all the memories of Isaiah Diaz that he has now are actually stories that his brain remembered from information you saw on TV or the internet in the past and then recreated on its own. And he had agreed with that opinion.

“…Anyway, the word ‘manipulated’ is a bit much. Call it ‘reconstructed’ instead.”

“Yeah, whatever.”

Bran, who had spoken shortly, suddenly stopped the car, opened the console box, and took out a checkbook. Why did he keep something like that in the console box? What if he got robbed? More than that, why was he taking it out? There were so many things he wanted to ask, but Bran’s atmosphere as he scribbled something on the check was so scary that he couldn’t bring himself to ask.

Bran, who had finished signing in the meantime, tore off the check and got out of the car. Then he picked up a brick lying on the road and used it to smash the pickup truck’s window in one go. While a surprised Isaiah stared with his mouth open, Bran nonchalantly slipped the check through the broken glass.

As he got back into the car, Isaiah cautiously said,

“Um, usually, you leave a business card, right…?”

“I hate getting calls. You got your seatbelt on?”

“Ah, yeah.”

Answering, Isaiah gripped the assist handle above the window tightly. He didn’t know why, but he felt like he had to. It was a kind of instinct.

And as expected, as soon as Bran put the gear in drive, he stepped on the gas pedal. Bang! With a considerable impact, the car collided, and the pickup truck’s side mirror shattered.

“……”

Finally free from the hellish gap, the car sped up and began to race through the narrow alley. While Isaiah held onto the handle even tighter without even screaming, Bran said in a calm voice,

“So, do you want to look around some more? Maybe then your hippocampus in your temporal lobe will get more stimulated and you’ll remember something? Whether you saw this scene in a refugee relief organization’s newsletter or in a Michael Moore movie?”

“No, I don’t think I need to see any more.”

Isaiah answered quickly.

“Okay. Then shall we go find a restaurant?”

As they exited the alley, Bran turned the car towards the beach without hesitation.

As if he was thoroughly sick of it, he didn’t slow down the car even as they passed the shopping district. Then, when the buildings on the right disappeared and the sea started to come into view again, he slowly reduced his speed. After confirming that Bran’s mood had improved, Isaiah cautiously asked,

“How much did you give? To the truck owner?”

“Enough.”

How much is enough? As Isaiah mumbled to himself, Bran added,

“It’s the cost of the broken side mirror and the broken glass, plus a little compensation for mental damage, but the truck owner will probably think he hit the jackpot.”

It seemed like he had given more than just a few extra bucks.

“Then won’t he just park his car like that again, without learning his lesson?”

“Next time, it won’t be the car window that gets smashed by a brick, but that guy’s head.”

It was a tone that wished it would happen.

“A fool who expects to meet a gentleman like me twice deserves it.”

“……”

The self-proclaimed gentleman seemed to be very angry. Well, the truck owner would probably be able to guess to some extent at the point when a brick and a check were lying in the driver’s seat. That the other person was very angry. Especially when the check was for an excessively large amount… Ah, this guy is crazy, I pissed off a crazy person, he would realize. Enough that he wouldn’t even dare to call, even if he saw the contact information written on the checkbook.

Anyway, he was lucky, and I hope he fixes his shitty parking habit this time. For his own sake, and for the sake of the people in that neighborhood.

While Isaiah was roughly concluding this, the car diligently drove on, and the pebble beach on the right had already turned into a white sandy beach. One by one, nicely decorated restaurants and cafes started to appear along the road. They had entered a full-fledged tourist area.

“Is there anywhere you want to go?”

Bran gave Isaiah the choice. He had slowed down the car so that he could look around, but it was hard to tell just by looking like this. Plus, since they had just come from looking at run-down pubs with faded signs, everywhere looked great. A restaurant with a large Christmas tree decorated at the entrance caught his eye, and Isaiah pointed to it.

“Shall we go over there? Where the Christmas tree is.”

“Brasserie… a French restaurant, is it. Sounds good.”

Bran checked that no cars were coming from the opposite lane, and without hesitation, turned the steering wheel. When he parked the car in the restaurant’s parking lot, there were surprisingly few empty spaces.

“Are they all captivated by the Christmas tree like us?”

“Or it could be a famous restaurant we don’t know about.”

The restaurant had outdoor seating, but because it was cold, there were no customers using it. The two of them naturally went inside. Bran opened the door for Isaiah to go in first, followed by Bran. It wasn’t an exaggeration to say that the moment they entered, everyone in the restaurant stared at them.

“Now you know why I told you to buy clothes, right?”

Bran said, heading towards the only empty table by the window. Of course, he knew. If two tall men showed up dressed in mourning clothes, they were bound to attract attention anywhere. Of course, they could just be seen as wearing black suits…

“That’s not great either. If young men are walking around a tourist spot in black suits, it’s one of two things.”

Either Mormons or the mafia. Bran said, pulling out a chair at the table.

“Don’t you think they’d think we’re Mormons…?”

“Too decadent for that.”

“Your impression?”

Isaiah asked, sitting down in the chair. Bran smiled briefly, then leaned in as if to push the chair in, whispering so only Isaiah could hear.

“Your dress shirt.”

Isaiah looked down at his black dress shirt. He was sure Mormons only wore white dress shirts.

Bran sat down, and soon a waiting staff came to take their order.

“Is this a famous restaurant, by any chance?”

At Isaiah’s question, the waiting staff put on a very humble expression and said,

“I don’t know if our restaurant is famous, but I can say for sure that the taste is amazing.”

Looking at the menu, the prices were so high that the food had better be good. Isaiah took the waiting staff’s recommendation and chose the course with a sausage dish cooked in the cassoulet style as the main. Bran ordered the same course but changed the main to sea bream steak.

“Is there anything else you need?”

“Coffee first. Strong.”

He had drunk some right before leaving the hotel, but it seemed his caffeine levels had already dropped again. As the waiting staff left, Isaiah finally let out a sigh and turned his gaze to the window. The Christmas tree, still a bit early, was probably just for attracting customers, as the lights were unusually bright. Isaiah, who had been quietly staring at the tree lights that were dazzling even in the daytime, suddenly remembered something and asked Bran.

“Come to think of it, are you Protestant?”

“No way.”

Judging by his nonchalant tone, the tattoo on his chest probably didn’t have any religious meaning.